Can't Make a Sound
by Smokingbomber
Summary: The experiences of Mamoru and the Shitennou's stones during the Stars arc of the manga, while he was dead and during the Galaxy Cauldron. In response to the TftM Drabble Challenge by transmissionsfromthemoon on tumblr and ao3.
1. Can't You Tell Me What's Happening?

**BEGIN: It Is Pitch Black \- Prompt: Nowhere**

"You are likely to be eaten by a grue," came Jadeite's voice from somewhere to the left, and Mamoru pinched the bridge of his nose, sigh stifled. He'd been in the airport...

"Not helping," said Nephrite from much closer, but pointed away from him, towards Jadeite. The much more blond of the two started to say something, then let out a strangled yelp.

"Jadeite!" Mamoru instantly pushed past Neph; he could vaguely sense where Jadeite's mind- soul- pretty rock? was, and-

"Zoi pinched me!"

The prince, already done, yelled, "We're in the middle of nowhere and you're STILL being jackasses?"

 **LATER: Very Long Weekend \- Prompt: Saturday**

"It's only supposed to be for a year," Mamoru murmured, leaning against Kunzite's shoulder. He couldn't see anything, and neither could his oldest guardian- worrisome. The guy could see in the dark and he couldn't see here.

"I know, my prince, you were taking us with you," said Kunzite's voice in dry amusement. "You've had us in your coat pocket since Saturday, keeping her ring company, because you didn't trust yourself not to misplace your carry-on or wear different trousers."

Mamoru's question was slow; he realized he was leaning on Kunzite. Leaning. "...I'm dreaming?"

The heavy, quiet answer: "...no, Endymion."

 **LATER: Endless Gardens \- Prompt: Flowers**

"But I can feel my nose. I can feel your hands. I can still feel the- the-"

Zoisite put a warm hand over Mamoru's mouth, and Mamoru could feel something like despair eating at his youngest guardian's heart. "Can you feel her?" he asked, and lowered his hand.

"Of course I can," retorted Mamoru. "She's the brightest star in the universe!"

"And Elysion? Can you give me a rose, Endymion? Can you pluck one from your endless gardens and hand it to me?"

Mamoru stilled, placing his hand over his heart. He had to swallow the panic as he tried.

 **LATER: The Ground Beneath Their Feet \- Prompt: Harmony**

"It's because you've got a massive ego, Endy," explained Jadeite cheerfully.

Mamoru opened his mouth to say something sarcastic, but the blond interrupted him. "No: not the pop-cultural understanding of the word. The psychological one.

"Your impulses are reined in by your perception of society and the balance of the world around you. You've made a seamless fusion of all your pieces of id, and all your intrinsic knowledge of the land, and of the hearts of the people around you, and it's all you."

"So if I admit I'm dead and let go, we'll be reborn?"

"Don't let go."

 **LATER: Stars Without \- Prompt: Midnight**

"I can hear the stars better here."

Mamoru looked up, then remembered it wouldn't do anything, then decided he didn't care. He sat twisting the air between his fingers like he held a blade of grass. "But we aren't anywhere. How can you hear them? I know you don't have to see th-"

Abruptly he shut up. He wanted to ask. He didn't want the answer.

"They're all around us. Where-ever we are, they're here too. Even if it's nowhere. They even know what time it is," said Nephrite with a laugh, and it sounded peculiar. Unhappy. "It's always midnight."


	2. I Have Become a Silent Movie

**I Have Become a Silent Movie**

 **LATER:** **The Slow Motion Moves Me** **\- Prompt: Never**

The first time, it was a shock out of nowhere - one that none of them expected, despite the guys knowing and Mamoru ignoring what had happened to him.

"I never- we never had- we never even had the chance to get close-" came Zoisite's voice, small in the dark, and Mamoru could feel Nephrite shutting down and he couldn't be in two places at once, even if none of them were actually any place at all.

So it was that Mamoru's arms went around Zoisite first, and he buried his face in hair that smelled of sunshine and flowering meadows.

 **LATER:** **The Monologue Means Nothing to Me** **\- Prompt: Scrumptious**

Everything hurt, and the prince didn't want to understand why, because he knew and acknowledging it would make it so much worse. But Kunzite held Zoisite after that, and Mamoru put a warm, heavy hand on Nephrite's shoulder and felt the shudder run through them both.

Then Nephrite was crushing his prince to his chest in a bearhug that, here, didn't smell of expensive alcohol. Mamoru fisted his hands in Nephrite's jacket and tried with all his heart to bring some of the stillness and warmth of Elysion to the astronomer king.

Nephrite's voice was muffled. "Her cupcakes- they were..."

 **LATER:** **Eyes Locked and Shining** **\- Prompt: Remember**

After Jupiter's star forgot how to tell time, Nephrite stopped bothering to talk to them, and none of the boys really tracked anything. Especially here, if one hurt, they all did-

-so no one knew how much time had passed before they all felt Mamoru crumple, but they all knew it was less than a second before the first chest-wracking sob ripped from his throat, and then they just kept coming.

Kunzite was 'there' first, but distance was only a construct, useful for sanity. Hands on their prince, none of them needed him to use words.

They felt Usagi remember.

 **LATER:** **Nobody Knows What He's Doing** **\- Prompt: Orange**

It could have been the same day. Zoisite was already attached to Kunzite, and Mamoru was still a trainwreck of echoes, locked in replays of his own death and what it was doing to Usagi.

When Kunzite's hand flew to his chest, eyes wide, he made a choked non-sound like a sword had just been thrust through it.

Nephrite's voice had a much duller edge to it. "And then there were two?"

"Shut up," hissed Zoisite. "If you're not going to help."

"I have pretend brandy. I am imagining the two of them making pumpkin pie."

Kunzite cough-laughed; it hurt.

 **LATER:** **Still Hanging 'Round** **\- Prompt: Optimist**

With Nephrite managing the gallows humor, Mamoru had nearly remembered how to be a human being again; he moved to try to help with Kunzite, but then he felt something sharp and silent from Jadeite, and Nephrite's initial question bounced back with an answer:

And then there was one.

So Mamoru pulled the fluffy-headed illusionist toward him, and was flooded with the war going on inside the boy who safeguarded endurance and harmony. The fire was out, and the ice threatened to take over, and even if she'd never have looked at him again-?

Patience whispered, "I can wait forever."


	3. The Names You Drop Put Ice in My Veins

**The Names You Drop Put Ice in My Veins**

 **LATER:** **All You Aspired To Do Was Endure** **\- Prompt: Royal**

"He wasn't close to them, not like-"

"They grew to respect him. And Saturn, he was- because of his daughter, especially, remember? And she could heal like him. And Pluto-"

"...ah."

Zoisite leaned into Kunzite again, both of them aware of their prince having withdrawn, trying to get his own emotions back under control, so that if there was the faintest possibility he could lend Usagi strength, he could do it.

"She really loved his future self, didn't she? And he knew it?" asked Zoisite finally, softly.

"And he knew he couldn't love her like that. But he treasures love."

 **LATER:** **All Cats Are Grey** **\- Prompt: Tragedy**

This time it was Zoisite and Jadeite holding Mamoru; was he getting all his information from Usagi's and Chibiusa's emotions, linked as he was to their souls? And were they getting their knowledge from their link to him?

It didn't matter: more of his people were falling, one by one, and it resonated in their master's heart, it shattered it piece by piece. Some hurt more than others, though every friend lost was a bit of him crumbling-

They didn't truly understand why this was worse than the deaths of the Outers.

They didn't get that she was _his cat_.

 **LATER:** **The Kids Aren't Alright** **\- Prompt: Offspring**

"It's not your fault," said Nephrite firmly, an edge of desperation in his voice.

"And we were still with you, always; we're here with you now," added Zoisite, insistent and offended.

Jadeite was a mixture of exasperation and breathless shared pain: "But- it's okay to feel like it's not fair, if- if that's- if it means you have focus."

He didn't say 'if it means you don't focus on your future daughter's star having been silenced'. It was understood.

Kunzite's hands threaded into Mamoru's hair. "You don't begrudge her them. You're not glad they're dead. Be angry- don't be guilty."

 **LATER:** **There's a Ghost in Every Town** **\- Prompt: Answers**

"We're all dead. All her protectors," came Mamoru's voice, dully, in the bleak eternal underground midnight. "She's alone. We promised her, we promised-"

His head fell into his hands, his voice made of ashes. "We haven't any time left to learn not to make promises we can't keep."

"Trust her, my prince," whispered Kunzite, cool hands bringing a focus to the reverent stillness and calm he carried and shared. "She's the brightest star in the universe. If anyone can find an answer to 'why' and fix it-"

"-then I can hold her, afterwards."

Finally, Mamoru cried silently into Kunzite's jacket.


	4. I Got a Long Way to Go

**I Got a Long Way to Go**

 **LATER: I'm Getting Further Away \- Prompt: Escape**

The pull was sudden, sharp, and rather stronger than Earth's gravity; the first light that shone in that neverending midnight was from Mamoru's chest, bright gold, bursting forth from his translucent body and showing the expression of terrified determination on his face as he grasped at and caught his guardians.

"STAY WITH ME-!" he yelled, but it came out as a strangled and breaking shriek. The answer was their only holding tighter as they were all pulled out, from nowhere into somewhere, out of the dark.

It was no escape.

He saw her horror; his wrists and soul were bound.

 **LATER: If I Didn't Know the Difference \- Prompt: Tomorrow**

It was only a half second until the Shitennou realized this would break what was left of him, after all he'd fought for, after all he'd lost.

Nephrite shielded his sight and hearing, feeding him the memory of the songs of the sky. Zoisite shielded his touch and taste, giving him the memory of softness and sweetness. Jadeite shielded him from the smell of this place, bringing the scent memory of gardens in sunlight-

Kunzite wrapped his mind and soul in the warm dark cocoon of his cape and whispered caring words: "Tomorrow will be brighter."

They'd keep him whole.

 **LATER: Living Alone'd Probably Be Okay \- Prompt: Mope**

The end of the fight was no relief.

Shielded as Mamoru was, the Shitennou could not save their prince from this latest death. Their only comfort was that Endymion would not know of its nature, its only point to break Serenity, Galaxia destroying an object Serenity was weak enough to love.

They couldn't stop the fall, but they could keep him from waking to his helplessness, and they could give up the rest of themselves to buy Serenity time to pull him out.

The only downside they could see was how it would hurt Mamoru.

"He'll mope forever," Nephrite muttered.


	5. Everything Means Nothing to Me

**Everything Means Nothing to Me**

 **NEXT: In a pool of water wishes \- Prompt: Imagination**

He woke up in the light, blinking and confused, but he felt them all around him: his guardians, his best friends, his first friends- people who meant more to his soul than anyone but Usagi and Chibiusa.

He didn't feel anyone else, but that was all right- everything was so bright, it couldn't be long before they'd either join them or bring them gasping to life. It was more than he could have dreamt or imagined.

Mamoru scrambled up and flung himself toward the woozy pile of them: his Shitennou, who'd always be at his side.

And he fell through.

 **NEXT: I picked up the song and found \- Prompt: Silly**

"My prince," Zoisite breathed next to his ear, and the words were all the caress that his arms could not grant. "Don't cry, it's silly. You always told Sailor Moon not to cry; it doesn't solve anything, does it?"

Mamoru scrubbed at his face; he was too old, he was too grown up, he was nineteen for godsake and he'd been going to go to Harvard-

Bright hair like fire and bright eyes like the deepest green gully took up his field of vision, and the kiss Zoisite bestowed on his forehead was ephemeral. "Stay safe for us, Endymion... Mamoru."

 **NEXT: My picture in the paper \- Prompt: Marshmallow**

They were vanishing; Zoisite was gone, and Jadeite came to crouch in front of Mamoru, giving him a crooked little grin. "You're like a toasted marshmallow, aren't you?"

The prince had to force himself to parse the words, and he couldn't even get annoyed, because they might be Jadeite's last. That annoyed him too, Jadeite getting the last word, and being annoyed just made his eyes well up again. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"That's what I mean, man. Crispy tar on the outside, and a big sweet gooey mess inside."

"Fuck...!"

"Maybe next time," laughed Jadeite, fading.

 **NEXT: The reflection in the water showed \- Prompt: Nudge**

"Yeah he's a nudge," Nephrite said fondly, and then he paused for a second before passing his hand through Mamoru's head, then cackling. "You have no idea how long I've wanted to try that!"

"You asshole- you're-" Mamoru couldn't stop crying and laughing, now, at the same time, and it was just getting worse and worse. "You're all assholes- leaving me now- why can't we be together? Why can't we ever be together? It's not fucking fair-"

"Bro. Bro. We're always with you. We're still with you, even if you can't see us anymore."

"Even if you say that- ...NEPHRITE!"

 **NEXT: An iron man still trying to salute \- Prompt: Opportunity**

Mamoru was on his feet, now, ugly-crying; he didn't care. His blue eyes flickered from where Nephrite had dissipated to where Kunzite still held his ground, and that's when he noticed the energy.

The glimmerings of light that the others had turned to while fading, Kunzite was directing toward him.

The prince's eyes widened. "Are you all- what are you doing?!"

For the first time he could remember, Kunzite gave him a real smile, full of affection and amusement, and for a second he almost looked solid.

"Giving you the opportunity to be the king you are, my liege."

"KUNZITE-!"

 **NEXT: People from a time when he was everything he's supposed to be \- Prompt: Summer**

They were all gone. Everyone he'd ever loved was gone, everyone with whom he'd ever shared a connection so deep, and he was alone. He was more alone than he'd been as a child, because at least then, he didn't know there was anything else.

Hands over his heart- no, over the bright, useless crystal in his chest- Mamoru just stared, raw grief running down his face in salt tracks.

For an instant, then, he caught the edge of a dream resplendent with golden light and green fields, deep blue open skies, and curtains and fountains of roses. And...

Them.

 **LATER: Why should you want any other \- Prompt: Itch**

He was numb, and everything was light, and all Mamoru could think of was that this couldn't be heaven; heaven wouldn't leave him alone. Alone in the light was really just another kind of alone in the dark, where he'd spent the majority of this life.

Then! Sensation, almost like an itch- and it nearly bloomed into pain, but transmuted to joy and hope.

Usagi. Usagi was safe, and he was holding her, finally-

-and there were the other senshi, and-

Usagi's wish for all of them to live together, as they were. But all of them didn't include his-

 **FAR FUTURE: When you're a world within a world \- Prompt: Author's Choice**

It had been a thousand years, and he had a lovely wife and all her friends that were his friends, too, and a beautiful daughter, within whom resided all the blinding light of the future. She was already a wonderful senshi, with her sisters from the Amazon at her side, their sailor crystals as bright as those of his wife's guardians.

And thank god- when they'd gotten back, there were the cats- oh, Diana.

But no one remembered the gems that had been four boys. Boys that never really got a second chance.

In this life, they'd been only _his_.


	6. Roll Away Your Stone

**Epilogue: Where you invest your love, you invest your life**

 **NOW: It seems that all my bridges have been burnt**

It had been too many years. He didn't know if they'd be forgiven, if Endymion would take them back when he found out, after so long.

Listlessly, Zoisite let a ball of fire coalesce in one hand, watching the flames dance as he leaned against the wall. Maybe Endy'd forgive them. Maybe if he found out it was his future self that told them–

He could feel the resigned sorrow in his king's spirit, as he had so many times before, and he didn't want to wait any longer.

But there were the others. He pushed himself off the wall.

 **NOW: But you say that's exactly how this grace thing works**

"He feels like that because we're not there," Jadeite told Zoisite patiently, handing him a to-go cup of overly sweet coffee. "What makes you think he'd rather be mad at us for us not having been there than actually have us there? You know he's not like that."

Zoisite turned the cup around in his hands, staring at it, then squinting up the sidewalk in the crystal city toward where the other two made their approach.

"But when he finds out we were in Elysion-"

"-he'll find out we were doing our jobs for him, the whole time. Don't worry."

 **NOW: It's not the long walk home that will change this heart**

"All I'm saying is, he's spent the entire time surrounded by beautiful women and being king of the entire god damned world, married to literally the woman of his dreams," insisted Nephrite as they walked.

"He may have missed talking to us, and we may have missed talking to him, but it's not like we weren't with him. He just couldn't sense us in all the background noise of Elysion; he couldn't see our stones in all that light from his crystal. If we hadn't been working from there, he'd've been screwed.

"And beautiful women. Tell me that's hard living."

 **NOW: But the welcome I receive with every start**

Kunzite looked up at the mammoth gates to the Crystal Palace, then produced the entry tickets to the coronation that the future version of King Endymion had handed them.

The guard glanced over them and did a doubletake. The paper was ancient and fragile, and the seats were VIP reserved- front row- and they bore the King's seal. "Right this way, gentlemen," she said hurriedly, and ushered them in, directing them.

Kunzite hadn't said a word the entire way, but the other guys knew him well enough that they could read his grimace as sheer joy getting him choked up.

 **NOW: Roll away your stone, I'll roll away mine**

It was Coronation Day for Queen Lady Serenity of the Crystal Millennium.

The reign of Neo Queen Serenity and King Endymion had lasted over a thousand years, and now that their daughter and her Senshi were ready, the elder generation was stepping back to an advisory capacity.

Once again, King Endymion wished with all his heart that his men could be there. Queen Serenity's hand tightened around his, and her eyes glistened for so many reasons.

They were both surprised at the blossoming warmth in his chest-

-and at the four faces in the front row who'd never been uninvited.


End file.
